This collection contains the call numbers X.d.483 (1-209).

The Papers of Robert Bennet contains mostly his official papers and reflect the shifting fortunes of the Parliamentarians and Royalists. The bulk of the papers listed here were written between 1642 and 1663 and arose out of his official position - commissions, orders, warrants, testimonials (134-139), a muster-roll (11), an examination and a list of prisoners taken at Penzance in 1648 (20-21), and mostly autograph letters signed to and endorsed by Bennet. Among Bennet's correspondents are his brother William, England's public minister in Hamburg "Lord" Richard Bradshaw, Colonel Anthony Buller, Francis Buller, Colonel Thomas Ceely, the Council of State, Major-General John Desborough, Francis Godolphin, Sir William Godolphin, Richard Lobb (not the M.P.), Vice-Admiral Robert Moulton, John Moyle, Sir Henry Pollexfen, Sir Richard Prideaux, Colonel Anthony Rous, and the Earl of Stamford. Several of these letters touch on the exchange of prisoners in the Scilly Islands and the ransom of captives in Sally where Bennet's brother William was a merchant. A number refer to Scotland and Ireland and the assessment and raising of troops for Ireland; two give news of the siege of Limerick in Sep. 1651 (99-100). Richard Lobb prevailed upon Bennet to get Parliament to remove certain customs on fish and tin. Occasionally a draft of Bennet's has survived; one is to John Rushworth (148); two are petitions to Cromwell about his arrears (116-117).

Among the personal papers is a detailed description by Dr. Hannibal Vyvyan of the disease Bennet was suffering from in 1649 and of the treatment he recommended (155), and a group of letters from and to fellow members of his Church at Looe (173-177). Bennet was an Anabaptist and was to attend the meeting of the Assembly of the messengers of the Churches at Wells on April 7, 1656; two of these letters discuss a Sister Cornish who was in danger of being lost to the Quakers. Two letters are from Sir Richard Vyvyan (181-182). A letter written in 1673 to his brother William discusses certain lands they are considering buying; in one corner of a manor near Dartmoor was a waste "inhabited time out of mind by a people of an unknown origin usually called the Gubbinses" (193).

There are also several miscellaneous manuscripts including The office of an attorney by John Mulys of Halmpstone, Devon, with a few lines of verse (196); a copy of the letter from the "agitators" to Sir Thomas Fairfax and others, April [28], 1647 (198); Reasons wherefore the officers of the mint should be freed from payment of any assessments, ca. 1650 (200); The humble proposals of the ministers who presented the petition to Parliament, [March 1653] (202); The resolution on religious toleration, December 15, 1654 (206); a report of a speech by Cromwell to a Parliamentary Committee refusing the kingship [April 13, 1657] (207); reports of other speeches by Cromwell to officers of the army [February 4-11, 1658] (208); and The alarum, a paper presented to the speaker of the House of Commons criticizing the King's ministers, April 1671 (209).